Sleep Tight
by Lythweird
Summary: After being awaken suddenly from a nightmare, Northern Ireland is comforted by Australia. Australia/Northern Ireland!OC. Drabble. R&R please.


**Disclaimer**: I do not own Hetalia but I do own my OC for Northern Ireland (William Hamilton).

I just wanted to write some Australia/Northern Ireland (AusNorn), a personal OTP of mine. This is an older fic, but I've only gotten around to posting it here now.

This little drabble deal's with Norn's issue of having nightmares. He's been prone to having horrid nightmares in his sleep (even inducing panic-attacks at times) throughout and ever since The Troubles happened. It's just...awful, I can't even begin to imagine what it's like to have such traumas caused by living through that awful time period in his nation's history.

William is Norn, and Australia is Stephen (it's my personal name for him, as I find it rather fitting ). Enjoy please, and do leave feedback if you can.

* * *

William awoke from his sleep with a sudden start. His body trembled violently, his breath hitched and wavered erratically in uneven breaks, and a cold sweat had broken out across his milky white skin. The memories ate away at his mind; the images were all too vivid to him as if they had just happened presently.

He could see the violence, the bloodshed; he could hear the piercing sound of gunshots, the explosions; he could nearly feel the fire scalding against his skin, and could nearly taste the bitterness of hatred all too clear of which he and his people had had to suffer through. It was too much; he could not handle it. The nightmares taunted him like a ghost whose purpose was never to be fulfilled, much like they had countless numbers of nights before this. He did not deserve to be weighted upon with such a heavy burden. He never asked for any of this. It was not his fault, yet, it felt as though a curse had been placed on him for whatever reason he knew would never be known to him. _How much could one take of this?_

He whimpered helplessly, afraid and terrified in his frantic daze. He began to desperately twist his limbs around from where he laid, griping and feeling for _anything _that he might be able to grab and hold onto for some feeling of comfort to soothe him.

Suddenly, a pair of strong arms wrapped around his tiny, shivering body, pulling him into a warm and welcoming embrace against a bigger and much, much warmer body, almost instantly causing the young British nation to stop writhing. Moist lips pressed against his ear lobe and a familiar, comforting voice whispered softly into his ear, "It's alrigh' mate, no one's gonna 'urt ya. You're alrigh', everything's okay. You're safe 'ere with me, _always," _reminding William that everything was going to be alright, that nothing was here to hurt him. It was just a dream.

William relaxed a bit as reality began to seep back into his consciousness, his adrenaline rush from before slowly leaving his system. He sighed, and then tilted his head against the other man's chest to look up into a warm set of emerald green eyes, strikingly similar to his own. The man smiled sweetly down at him as he brushed the Northern Irishman's fringe of hair out of his eyes.

"Stephen…" William breathed out softly, almost in relief as he moved himself to press even closer against his lover's form, his trembling still prevalent despite having calmed down considerably, having not completely recovered from his sudden panic attack. "I-I—"

"Hush now," the Australian interrupted the other, keeping his arms firmly around the other and pressed a light kiss to his cheek in an attempt to calm him even more so. "Go back t'sleep now, love, ya need it. It was only a dream."

William's eyes went wide as he opened his mouth to speak, "B-but—" A finger quickly silenced him as the other pressed the digit up against his lips to prevent him from saying anything farther.

"Hush, babe, hush, _please_," the Australian chided to the other carefully, "Ya don't have t'worry about anything, got it. I'm 'ere, an' I'm not gonna let anything hurt ya. I'm not goin' anywhere soon at that."

William only managed a weak smile in response to hearing such reassurance from the Aussie, his love. His eyes began to droop a bit from exhaustion and the coziness of being confined in the other's arms against his warm body. "Thank you," He replied softly and nuzzled into Stephen's neck, gripping at the collar of his shirt in an almost needy manner.

"No need t'thank me, love. Always remember I'm 'ere for ya, alright? Alright. Don't you ever forget that either." He sighed softly down into the other's hair before speaking up again, one of his hands loosening its grip to move up and into the other's messy red hair, "In fact, I'm always gonna be here for you, whether ya like it or not, heh." Steve chuckled a bit in response to his own reply and gently began to stroke his hand through the other's hair, fondling with a few strands between his own fingers lovingly all the while.

William took solace in his lover's words and simply nodded in response to everything he said, "A-a'right," he just managed to get out, words failing him right at that moment. He was far too tired and weak to speak coherently now, and simply laid there in Stephen's arms. He did not want to move for the life of him. Slowly but surely, he was lulled to sleep by his lover's comforting words and loving gestures. He slipped back into the realm of slumber, spending the rest of the night tucked safely in the other's protective hold without another disturbance to interrupt the young couple again.


End file.
